C. Police Every Palestinian who wishes to file a complaint to the police against an Israeli civilian must be permitted to do so. The practice of sending complainants from one police station to another, or otherwise preventing them from complaining, must cease. -
Investigations must be conducted in serious cases of violence by Israeli civilians although no official complaint is made. It is, therefore, essential to monitor media reports, especially in the Palestinian press, continuously (as recommended by the Karp Commission).
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Police handling of offenses by Israeli civilians against Palestinians must be accelerated, and a thorough investigation conducted, in every case.
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If a Palestinian is killed by Israeli civilians, efforts must be made to locate Palestinian eyewitnesses and to take their testimony.
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State Attorney’s Office
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The State Attorney’s Office must demand from the police thorough, speedy, and comprehensive investigations of offenses imputed to Israeli civilians against Palestinians in the Territories.
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If there is evidence that Israeli civilians committed an offense against Palestinians in the Territories, the suspects must be brought to trial.
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Appropriate deterrent punishments should be demanded for Israeli offenders who injured Palestinians or damaged Palestinians property in the Territories.
Courts
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Parity must exist in the punishment imposed on convicted Israelis and Palestinians. Only parity can ensure that punishments are commensurate with offenses and deter future similar criminal offenses.
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When deciding on the punishment for Israeli civilians who have been convicted of offenses against Palestinians, judges should consider only the concrete case before them, and not base their verdicts directly or indirectly on the offender’s origin or ideological motives.
EPILOGUE
On February 25, 1994, Baruch Goldstein, a resident of Kiryat Arba and a member of Kach, entered the Hall of Isaac in the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron. The hall was filled with hundreds of Muslim Palestinian worshippers. Goldstein, carrying an automatic rifle supplied by his army reserve unit, opened fire as they kneeled on the floor, killing twenty nine of the worshippers. Dozens more were wounded. The government established a judicial commission of inquiry to investigate the event. Headed by Justice Meir Shamgar, President of Israel’s Supreme Court, the committee began its hearings on March 8, 1994, a week before the publication of this report.
B'Tselem is of the opinion that the facts contained in this report show that Goldstein’s act did not originate in a vacuum. Its background was the continuous incitement to attack Palestinians, and was another link, the most serious and tragic of all, in the chain of violent acts perpetrated by settlers against Palestinians involving the frequent and illegal use of firearms. Throughout this chain, most of the offenders escaped punishment.
In the more than six years of the Intifada, and indeed, as the Karp Commission report suggests, for a much longer period, the authorities ignored this abnormal and dangerous situation, rarely choosing to enforce the measures prescribed by both Israeli and international law.
Against this background, and in the light of the pronouncements of residents of Kiryat Arba and of other settlements after the Hebron massacre, Goldstein’s act cannot be perceived as the act of a single person estranged from his environment. It was the bitter fruit of long years of faulty and omissions.
APPENDICES
APPENDIX 1
Comparison between the Rights of Israeli Detainees and Palestinian Detainees in the Territories
Authority to arrest without a warrant
Palestinians in the Territories
| Israeli Citizens |
Any soldier or policeman may arrest anyone who violates the Security Provisions Order or is suspected of doing so, regardless of the likelihood that the detainee committed the offense, or of its seriousness. The order covers an array of offenses, some of them vague, such as “an act liable to impair the public safety.” The detainee may be held in custody for ninety-six hours. An officer of the Police Department may then extend the detention period if he has reasonable cause to think that the person violated the order, or that the evidence before him requires an extension of the detention (sec. 78 of the Security Provisions Order).
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A policeman may detain a person only for one of the eight circumstances which take into account the severity of the offense and the degree of certainty that the person committed the offense. The permitted period of detention is forty-eight-hours. Examples of these circumstances include: where a person commits an offense in the presence of a policeman, escapes from lawful custody, or refuses to identify himself or accompany the police officer (sec. 3 of the Criminal Procedure (Detention and Search) Ordinance [New Version], 1969). A private individual may detain another person if he is escaping from lawful custody, if he saw him commit a crime, or has been ordered to do so by a judge. (Sec. 6 of the Criminal Procedure (Detention and Arrest) Ordinance [New Version] 1969)
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Duration a detainee may be held before being brought before a judge
Palestinians in the Territories
| Israeli Citizens |
Detainees may be held in custody for eight days before being brought before a judge. Adult detainees may be held for eighteen days for certain offenses, e.g. deliberately causing death, sheltering a person suspected of causing death, aggravated espionage, assaulting a person serving the IDF or its branches (Order No. 1391, March 24, 1993, in West Bank and Order No. 1903, March 25, 1993, in Gaza)
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Adults:
May be held in custody forty-eight hours before being brought before a judge. If this condition is not met, the detainee is released. If the judge was absent for a justifiable reason, the detainee may be held another forty-eight hours (sec. 16 of the Criminal Procedure (Detention and Search) Ordinance [New Version], 1969).
Minors:
A minor above fourteen must be brought before a judge within twenty-four hours; if there is a special reason that he could not be brought before the judge, the minor can be held an additional twenty-four hours. A minor below fourteen must be brought before a judge within twelve hours, extendable for another twelve hours if a special reason exists and if the extension of detention is essential for public security or the minor’s security, or if there is a danger that evidence will disappear. (Sec. 10 of the Youth (Prosecution, Punishment, and Procedures) Law, 1971)
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Arrest by a judge before an indictment is filed
Palestinians in the Territories
| Israeli Citizens |
A jurist-judge (a military court judge who has legal training) may issue an order of arrest for up to thirty days, extendable, against a detainee who has not yet been indicted. After three months, if no indictment has been submitted, only the regional legal advisor may ask for an extension, and only via the military appeals court. The latter may extend the detention for three more months. (Amendment 68 to the Security Provisions Order, Order No. 1378 of Oct. 20, 1992 in the West Bank, and Amendment 70 to the Security Provisions Order, Order No. 1081 of Oct. 11, 1992, in Gaza)
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Adults:
The court may detain a suspect prior to indictment for fifteen days, extendable for fifteen more days. After thirty days, the Attorney General must request an extension (sec. 17 of the Criminal Procedure (Detention and Search) Ordinance [New Version], 1969). If after ninety days no indictment has been submitted, the suspect is released (sec. 51 of the above law). A Supreme Court Judge may, however, order a further detention of up to 3 months, which may be extended from time to time (sec. 51 of the above law).
Minors:
As above, but ten days of detention instead of fifteen days are permitted each time, and a total of twenty days in detention instead of thirty days. (Sec. 10(4) of the Youth (Prosecution, Punishment, and Procedures) Law, 1971)
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Meeting with an attorney
Palestinians in the Territories
| Israeli Citizens |
The detainee must be permitted to meet with an attorney as soon as possible. If he is being interrogated, a police officer (chief inspector and up) may, after submitting his reasons in writing, delay the meeting by a few hours if he thinks that interrupting the interrogation might be damaging. The order permits a meeting to be deferred for fifteen days from the day of detention if the person in charge of the interrogation so directs in writing, citing the security of the region or the good of the interrogation. A police officer with the rank of chief superintendent and higher or the head of the GSS interrogations division may, in writing, extend this for another fifteen days. A jurist-judge may prevent a meeting for above reasons for thirty more days, and the president of a military court or the on-duty president may extend this another thirty days, if the IDF regional commander states in writing that the restriction is necessary for reasons of regional security. A detainee may be kept from seeing a lawyer for a total of ninety days. (Sec. 78b-d, Security Provisions Order)
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The detainee must be permitted to meet with a lawyer as soon as possible. If a police officer with a rank of superintendent or higher thinks that interrupting the interrogation will be damaging, he may ask in writing for a delay of a few hours, and if state security or human life, or preventing a crime is involved, the meeting can be delayed again, but on no account for more than forty-eight hours. In case of suspicion of crimes such as treason, espionage, or violations of the anti-terrorist ordinance, the head of the interrogation, if he thinks it warranted by state security or the good of the interrogation, may prevent a meeting between the detainee and his attorney for seven days from the day of detention. For the same reasons, a police officer with a rank of commander and higher or the head of the GSS interrogations division may prevent the meeting for another eight days. A detainee may be kept from meeting with an attorney for fifteen days. (Sec. 29, Criminal Procedure Law [Consolidated Version], 1982)
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Remand until the end of proceedings
Palestinians in the Territories
| Israeli Citizens |
After filing of the indictment, a jurist-judge may order the suspect held in custody until the end of the proceedings against him for an indefinite period, regardless of the length of time of the proceedings. After a year from the date the detention commenced, the defendant may request, once every six months, that his detention be reviewed. If there are new facts or new circumstances, including the time that has passed since his detention, a review may be requested even before the end of the first year. A judge’s decisions to detain the suspect until the end of the proceedings or to reject a request for a rehearing by the military appeals court may be appealed. A detainee being held in custody until the end of the proceedings in the wake of an indictment may appeal the detention order only after three months’ detention. (Amendment No. 68 to the Security Provisions Order, Order No. 1378 of Oct. 20, 1992 in the West Bank, and Amendment No. 70 to the Security Provisions Order, Order No. 1081 of Oct. 11, 1992 in Gaza)
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A defendant may be ordered held in custody until the end of his trial only in defined instances enumerated in law:
1. His release may lead to an obstruction of justice, may endanger life or public security, etc.
2. Serious crimes: drugs, violence involving use of a weapon, offense against a minor, or abuse of a victim’s mental or emotional impairment. Other than these crimes, the gravity of the offense does not justify remand until the end of the proceedings, and release on bail is to be preferred.
3. The bond set by the judge was not paid, or the terms of bail were violated.
In any event, a defendant will be held in custody until the end of the proceedings only after the court has heard arguments, the defendant being represented by counsel, and there is sufficient evidence to prove the charge (sec. 21a, Criminal Procedure Law [Consolidated Version] 1982).
If the trial has not ended within a year, the defendant will be released (sec. 53 of the above law). A Supreme Court judge may, however, order a defendant to be detained for an additional three months, and he may extend the detention from to time (sec. 54 of the above law).
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APPENDIX 2
Palestinians Killed by Israeli Civilians in the Territories, December 9, 1987 December 31, 1993
Name
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Date of Death (M.D. Y.)
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Last Known Status of File
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1988
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|
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15. Ahmed Hussein Bisharat
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11.7.88
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Closed – “Shooting according to directives”
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Name
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Date of Death (M.D. Y.)
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Last Known Status of File
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1989
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|
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32. Muhammad Jamil al-Karmal
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12.22.89
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Closed – “Offender unknown”
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1990
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|
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33. Mustafa Kallab
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2.6.90
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Convicted of causing death by negligence
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41. Ahlam Ibrahim ‘A’id
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12.12.90
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Closed – “Offender unknown”
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Name
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Date of Death (M.D. Y.)
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Last Known Status of File
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1991
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|
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47. Iyyad Muhammad Zadafiyah
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6.16.91
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Closed – “Offender unknown”
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1992
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48. Marzuq a-Deqeiq
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11.16.92
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Indictment filed
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1993
49. Liwa’ Rafiq Muhammad Bakrun
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1.19.93
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Indictment filed
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50. Jum’ah ‘Abd al-‘Aziz Misq
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3.2.93
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Indictment filed
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62. Sa’di Abd al-Hadi Fataftah
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12.10.03
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Under investigation
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APPENDIX 3
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